Your cases are very different. Holidays made with Virgin Holidays would be ABTA bonded, so cash with them protected by that scheme. The only question could be if you have accepted a travel voucher. I think is a more unknown area. Martin Lewis seems to think if you paid by card you’d still be protected by the card but I’m not so sure as I’ve not seen this tested. But I’ve no reason to believe Martin Lewis is wrong, I generally trust what he says on things like this. One of my issues is if debit card chargeback I would have thought you need them to have money in their bank account, I do not believe the bank is directly/jointly liable but could be wrong.
Bookings flight only however are not ATOL protected. So you would be relying on card payment protection. If paid by credit card then section 75 should cover you. As above if debit card I’m not sure you would be covered.
just because Virgin Australia has failed does not in itself mean the U.K. business will as well. From what I’ve seen it feels like the UK arm is slightly better placed. It does need a cash injection, but Branson is asking for a loan and offering his island as security, I would have thought this ought to aid a deal being done. The problem is the government would not want to be seen to aiding 1 company over another. There are other airlines that are known to have threatened legal action at previous proposed bailouts. The question I guess is whether a loan is considered a bailout rather than an equity based actual bailout. My gut is the UK airline will survive, but it is just a gut.
Good luck